Occupant detection systems have the ability to determine the presence and/or characteristics of an occupant at a specific location. However, environmental conditions, such as humidity and moisture, may interfere with the occupant detection system's readings.
Although useful in a wide variety of industries, occupant detection systems may be used in automotive applications to determine whether a person is present in a vehicle, and if so, the size of the person. This information serves various purposes, including enabling/disabling an airbag system. In many vehicles, each seat has at least one corresponding airbag. Generally, during an accident, the airbags are deployed so long as a person is detected in the corresponding seat. While airbags have been known to provide additional safety to adult and larger children traveling in vehicles, it is not always ideal to deploy the airbag even though a person is detected. For this reason, the occupant detection system further determines the person's size before enabling/disabling the airbag system.
Although occupant detection systems may be generally reliable, environmental conditions like humidity in the air or moisture on the seat may interfere with the occupant detection system's ability to determine the person's presence or size. For instance, humidity or moisture may cause some children or car seats to be mischaracterized as adults. Accordingly, an occupant detection system is needed that compensates for environmental conditions. However, before doing so, the occupant detection system must be calibrated.